


The Talk

by oh_anakin



Category: Hiccup Series - Cressida Cowell
Genre: Gen, hiccup would like to be literally anywhere else, old wrinkly is your bitchy weed grandpa, stoick avoids his feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-26 23:54:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21957757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oh_anakin/pseuds/oh_anakin
Summary: Ever since Hiccup's birthday, something has been bothering Stoick. Old Wrinkly decides to stop letting him ignore it.
Comments: 11
Kudos: 37





	The Talk

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in July/August 2019, and I'm only getting around to posting it now. Enjoy the product of my weird fucking brain.

Stoick the Vast tried to be a good father.

It wasn't always easy, of course, but he did try his best, and he liked to think he succeeded, most of the time.

A mostly-absent spouse was one thing; he'd mostly learned to handle himself without Valhallarama around. An absent child was a whole different Bashy-ballgame. Hiccup did have a habit of disappearing, whether by kidnapping or some Quest to save his dragon, although he always turned back up, and usually in time for dinner too.

A few days after Hiccup's twelfth birthday (well, technically, third, but who's counting?), Stoick decided to take advantage of the quiet afternoon by slumping into his fireside chair for a warm, comfortable nap. (Even Chiefs needed a little "Me Time" every now and again.)

His eyes had just closed when a thin finger poked his left bicep. "Stoick."

"Mmfrgh." Stoick rolled away from the ancient, bothersome finger. "Go away."

“It's about HICCUP," said Old Wrinkly.

"Whatever it is, he'll be fine," mumbled Stoick, who was already very sleepy, "I checked just fifteen minutes ago and he wasn't kidnapped YET."

"No, he's not kidnapped, which is why I'm HERE." Stoick couldn’t see, but he could tell from Old Wrinkly’s tone that his father-in-law was cross. "You're avoiding something."

Unfortunately, he was right; Stoick WAS avoiding something, and he wasn't about to stop now either.

Another poke rudely interrupted Stoick’s wandering mind. "All right, I see I shall have to spell it out for you. Last I saw, Hiccup's not doing anything life-threateningly important. That hardly ever seems to happen these days. Rip the bandage off, Stoick. It'll be better for both of you."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Stoick stalled for time.

“Now you have to give him THE TALK, Stoick."

Stoick was no longer sleepy.

"If he doesn't learn it from you, he'll learn it somewhere else. Just this morning, I overheard Dogsbreath muttering to some of the other boys about..." Old Wrinkly turned slightly pink. "Well. Do you really want Hiccup to find out about the Facts of Life from Dogsbreath the Duhbrain?"

“Oh. Oh dear.” Stoick immediately understood Old Wrinkly's concern. Dogsbreath the Duhbrain barely knew his teeth from his toes.

He'd been excited to have a son. He’d imagined playing Bashyball with him, comparing biceps, teaching him how to groom his nose-hair with the shiny side of a pot…

Stoick loved his son more than anything, but you have to see, he didn't always UNDERSTAND him.

Stoick remembered having The Talk with his own father well. Too well, in fact. When your father calls you in to talk about "the birds and the bees", it's only NATURAL to think he's talking about how to USE birds and bees to fight your enemies.

Sort of a nasty tactic popular with Visithugs and Barbarians, too underhanded for a Hooligan to use and call himself an honorable Viking. But Old Squidface had figured a good Viking should know how his enemy fought so he could, er, make a tactical retreat if things got too sticky and stingish.

After The Talk was over, to lighten the mood, Squidface had thrown a beehive at Stoick and told him to "FIGHT THE BEES". (That ended about as well as you would expect.)

Stoick wasn't in the mood to go looking for a beehive. The Archipelago hadn't quite figured out spring was supposed to have arrived by now, so everything was cold and soggy and a bit crunchy, but not SO crunchy that you didn't sink up to your thighs in muddy bog.

But then, if he went looking for a beehive, well, that could take up the rest of the day. Why, he probably wouldn’t even SEE Hiccup.

“There are no beehives this time of year,” Old Wrinkly said.

"But--but--I haven't PREPARED anything," Stoick sputtered.

"Psh." Old Wrinkly waved that off. "Vikings don't need to prepare."

"That's true," Stoick had to admit.

"Just tell him the truth. He's a smart boy. He’ll be fine."

"Don't you think he's a little YOUNG? He's only just turned twelve. Well, three, really..." Stoick ran nervous fingers through his beard (which already looked a bit like a burning bush lost a fight with a hurricane). "Three's awfully young. My father didn't sit ME down for a talk till I was thirteen."

"Hiccup will be 52 on his thirteenth birthday," said Old Wrinkly drily. “The longer you wait, the more he hears.” Then Old Wrinkly bent over and whispered in Stoick’s ear an example of what the older boys in the Pirate Training Program were saying, but I’m afraid that it is, frankly, too ignorant and gross to be repeated here.

Stoick gave a great sigh. He was running out of excuses. "Why don't you do it?" he asked peevishly. "He listens to YOU."

"Well the answer to that is very simple," Old Wrinkly said. "I don't want to."

"Oh for Thor's SAKE..." Stoick began hauling himself upright.

Maybe Old Wrinkly was right. Really, this was the perfect time, Stoick told himself. That Bog-Burglar girl, Cami-whatsit, had shoved herself into Hiccup's odd little posse, so it was really just safety for a bit further down the line...

Too quickly, Old Wrinkly shepherded Hiccup into the chair right in front of Stoick. Before disappearing outside and locking the door behind him.

"Toothless has been with me all day, I swear, so whatever happened--" A grumpy huff of smoke came out from beneath Hiccup's helmet, making him cough. He retorted something in Dragonese at the smoke-huffer (Footless, unseen).

Hopefully Hiccup would grow out of the whole "letting his dragon sleep in his bed" thing by the time he got married.

"Sit down, Hiccup, my boy!" Stoick boomed. He was determined to project strength, calm, and a sort of Chiefly casualness.

Hiccup sat.

All the words Stoick had intended to say suddenly evaporated. "Well. Um."

Not a great start, for sure.

Hairy Hooligans never back down, Stoick reminded himself. His palms were suddenly very sweaty. He picked up his helmet from the fireplace mantel. "You see this?"

"Uh huh," said Hiccup. "It's a helmet."

"It's also a METAPHOR," Stoick said. "The horns poke whoever tries to grab you by the head. The bowl shape is so you can wiggle out of it easily if they somehow hang on, but ALSO so you can pull the helmet down over your opponent's eyes. It, um, what's the word..."

"Multitasks?" Hiccup suggested.

"Something like that. Yes."

"So. the same way Vikings' helmets can do multiple things, so can... um... ." Stoick ran out of words. “Well. Arms are for punching, fingers for thieving, and so forth…”

"Father, could you please get to the point?" Hiccup glanced out the window, clearly impatient. "I promised Fishlegs I'd help him with spring cleaning this afternoon."

"Now girls are very special. MUCH more special than helmets.”

“Hang on!” Hiccup frowned. “What do girls have anything to do with--”

“As you get older-- if you haven't already-- um... I know the older boys in your class probably have, so you might've heard some... things." Stoick fumbled for words. "Boys notice girls, girls notice boys, and sometimes one or the other or both think, 'well, why don't we... uh...'"

When Hiccup finally caught on, Hiccup turned the color of a sunburnt tomato. "Father, we really don't have to talk about this now. I'm FINE. REALLY."

“Nonsense!” Stoick waved off both their blushing concerns. “It’s important for you to know the Facts.”

To say this “wasn’t going well” would be an understatement.

Stoick bluster-stammered out something about how bodies started changing at a certain age, to be more prepared for adulthood and That Stuff, which by the way was only really convenient inside the sacred confines of Marriage, not that there's anything exactly WRONG with being OUT of marriage (Thor knows nobody's perfect), but really, it's best to wait till you find someone you're REALLY sure about, just to be on the safe side… That Stuff is very messy, sort of by nature, you’ve got to understand… Chiefly Fathers have a thing about occasionally, sometimes, lightly pummelling potential suitors into mush if they so much look at the Chief’s Daughter the wrong way...

(Not even he could really make sense of it by the end.)

"Now you're still very YOUNG yet, and thank Thor for that! I didn't bother worrying about those kinds of things till I had a blooming crop of chest hair." Stoick hoped that was a properly comforting thing to say. “Also, Big-Boobied Bertha will flatten any young men who look the wrong way at her weird little daughter, so keep that in mind."

"Oh, you don't need to worry about that.” Hiccup cringed.

Neither father nor son could look each other in the eye.

"Now you know you can always come to me if you have questions--" Stoick began, because it was the thing fathers were supposed to say.

Hiccup, correctly, picked up on that as a signal the conversation was nearly over, an Easy Out. "NO. Nope, no questions, none at all!" Hiccup sprang up from his seat and made a beeline for the door. "I've got it, thanks Father and now I REALLY have to go--”

As soon as the door shut, Stoick let out a great sigh.

"Thank THOR that's over."

He then tucked himself in for a nap, and forgot all about it.

* * *

Later, Hiccup relayed the humiliating events of earlier that afternoon to Fishlegs while they rooted out bits of rotted cabbage from Fishlegs’ humble little hut.

"He said WHAT?" Fishlegs scratched his head, the picture of bafflement.

"I know," said Hiccup, still a bit green. "He thought _Camicazi_ and I would be interested in each other. Camicazi!"

Fishlegs snorted. "I think our Bog-Burglar friend is much more interested in herself than anyone else-- let alone a Hairy Hooligan, and a BOY at that." 

Hiccup laughed a little himself. 

That awoke Toothless from his nap inside Hiccup's shirt, and the little dragon demanded to know what they were talking about. When Hiccup explained, Toothless hissed in disgust. _**"H-h-humans gross. Dragons MUCH more sensible."**_

FIshlegs scratched his head. "You know, I don't know what he's saying, but I'm almost sure I agree with him." 

"Some dragons can actually reproduce without a mate if necessary," Hiccup said, suddenly remembering (and glad for the chance at a topic change). (He was a bit of a magpie when it came to obscure facts of dragon biology.) "I think Sea-Dragons can, since there are so few of them. You hardly ever see two of them together at the same time."

"And thank Thor for THAT," Fishlegs said. "I don't fancy watching another Green Death swallow you whole."

The conversation then veered off into the well-trod path of "why are Vikings the way they are", and Hiccup was glad for the distraction. He hadn't given much thought to these kinds of things before, and he wasn't about to start now. 


End file.
